


Moonshadow

by mresundance



Category: Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Basically there is a lot of feelings which don't come to fruition, M/M, Musical References, POV Poe Dameron, Poe Dameron Needs A Hug, Self-Harm, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-26 09:10:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13232589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mresundance/pseuds/mresundance
Summary: Post The Last Jedi: In which Poe Dameron has angst about what he did in TLJ and finds comfort in some music. Which of course he has to share with Finn.





	Moonshadow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MemoryPalaceofWillGraham (JaxCat)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaxCat/gifts).



1\. _Where_ _do you go, where do you go_

Poe Dameron fell in love one gray afternoon when there was nothing else to do. A silver mist of rain sprayed over everything, the damp seeping into crannies and corners. It made the ends of his hair curl, and the library smell richly of earth and old books.

To say the Library of Senid was _interesting_ wouldn’t quite cover it. “Interesting” was quaint. This library was one hundred trees large, each one of them in a symbiotic relationship with the technology which stored thousands of books, tapes, and disks within the rock hard bark. The trees flourished from this strange symbiosis, growing taller and thicker than their neighbors. The library sprawled between the roots of the trees, librarians busy checking out materials, or archiving and reshelving, climbing up and down long ladders. Between these thick roots patrons would sit in plush chairs, reading or listening. The entire structure was encased in a clear dome, through which the rest of the forest was visible, as well as the sky.

It was a luxury for those few who remained of the Resistance to find themselves camped out near a literally flourishing library. A temporary luxury. General Organa had made it clear they would be moving on soon enough. She planned to keep moving from hiding place to hiding place in order to evade the First Order.

He’d been thinking too much: of failure and shame, of Vice Admiral Holdo and that fracturing line she drew through space, time, and the First Order fleet. But mostly of failure. It buzzed in his brain, and in order to stop it he went down to the library for some music. Any music would shut it up. He browsed tree trunks for what seemed like forever before finally losing patience. He grabbed a tape. It was small enough to fit in the palm of his hand. The smudged printed words on the back cover said it was some kind of album. It had been recorded as radio waves traveling through space from some distant place, from long, long ago.

It would do. Poe checked it out. He felt a little embarrassed to be following all the rules. He needed Finn there to reassure him that following the rules as probably a good thing, especially with libraries.

Back in his narrow little bunk, he stuck the tape in his portable player and put his headphones on. He lay down, listening. He was restless, unable to settle. He wanted to be up in the heavens. He wanted to soar through space without any worry except the next target. He wanted to blow some shit up and watch it cartwheel off into nowhere.

But he’d been grounded until further notice. Part of his penance he supposed, bitterly, wishing he could hate General Organa for the order, but knowing with every bone in him that she was right and he _deserved_ it.

By the middle of the tape be began to listen. The language sung was some ancient form of the Common Tongue, somewhat primitive but still understandable, something Poe thought miraculous. The singer was singing something about not making a change. _You’re still young, that’s your fault, there’s so much you have to know._ No kidding, brother. As he listened, he became absorbed in the songs and the lyrics. They were simple, none of this complicated mumbo-jumbo. The music was from a time and place which seemed really naive, but he liked that. It was nice to listen to that, to have that kind of hope and openness. He had never really had either, not since Mama died. And ever since the he’d been too busy fighting. Always fighting.

But most of all the naivete, the openness, the hope made him think of Finn. And it gave him a funny kind of feeling he couldn’t place. Like a golden sun pouring warmth over everything, until one was hot down into the marrow.

 

2. _If you want to live low, live low_

“Come on, buddy. Come and listen to this album with me.”

He wasn’t sure why he was asking Finn. If anything, he should have just checked the album back into the library. Instead he was bugging Finn about it like some schoolboy wanting to show off his pet razad.

Finn was watching Rey. Again. Every day, she went down into a rocky room carved in the deeper, darker recesses of the hidden base. She went to practice with her lightsaber, and her Jedi stuff, which even Poe had to admit was impressive. He still didn’t quite believe she’d lifted all those rocks using the Force.

She used to practice further up in the base, in a place nearer to all the public traffic. Too many people came and watched her, and it unnerved Rey. So she’d found a more sequestered space. Only Finn and BB-8 and sometimes General Organa would watch her now, as her lightsaber arced through the air, or boxes and rocks lifted from the ground while Rey stood upside down on one hand.

And Poe. He felt like an outsider. He wasn’t really friends with Rey and he only came because that’s where Finn was.

But today he had a _purpose_.

“You’ve gotta come listen to this album,” he said again.

Rey was “fighting” an orb which floated in the air, firing small blaster shots at her. She deflected the shots, and when she missed, the blaster stung and burned, leaving little blisters in her skin.

Both men grimaced when Rey missed a shot. Her shoulders and arms were speckled with blisters, both fresh and healing.

“Well?” Poe asked as Rey resumed.

Finn shifted. He kept his eyes on Rey. Poe felt a spike of jealousy and he had no idea why he should feel that. It was the same jealousy, if he were honest, that he felt towards Rose before she realized that Finn wasn’t interested. Now Rose was with that other mechanic, the tall girl from Sarlac, and Poe respected how she hadn’t spent a second wallowing. But still he had been very briefly -- jealous.

“Maybe some other time,” Finn said.

He seemed terribly sad, not at all the resilient man Poe knew him to be. And Poe had no idea why.

 

3\. _You’re_ _eating my heart away_

The buzzing hadn’t stopped, but it was bearable, just a low vibrato under the skin. But the shame, however, swamped him, lavender colored and thick. He listened to the album. He played chess with Chewie. He worked out until he was shuddering with heat and exhaustion. He dreamed of flying right past the suns and planets and heading for distant stars. He thought of begging General Organa to let him fly again. It was like being unable to breathe, this not flying.

But he deserved every miserable second of it. He deserved to have the lavender creep up on him while he was showering, or right before he fell asleep at night. To have it smother him until he was sweating and choking. He would wake up well before his alarm and watch the night and stars pass through his little window, but when he blinked he saw lavender.

He wished he had someone to talk to. That was a crazy thought. Talking about things. The language he most understood was the thunder of the atmosphere as he left it, of blasters and being in or out of range, of how to survive in a scuppered ship in the middle of space, of evasive and defensive maneuvers. Talking to people about what he felt was not any of these things and was therefore alien and difficult.

He wondered if General Organa would appreciate him saying _I was wrong. I can see that now and it’s eating me alive, how wrong I was._ Probably, but she didn’t want some mopey pilot whinging on her.

He had tried talking to BB-8, but BB-8 had suggested he get shitfaced drunk and even offered to mix several cocktails, including the Kessell Run, to help him on his way. Poe had been tempted, very tempted, but in the end he opted to not to wake up in a state of filthy, disgustingly hung over which he was capable of.

That pretty much left Finn, and that thought terrified Poe. Terrified him like the one time he was stranded, with limited air supply, drifting through the great black alone.

So he was drenched in his shame. One night he threw up. Another night, back at his bunk, he remembered a stupid mistake he’d made at the chess table earlier. A small mistake, and no one died, certainly, but a mistake nonetheless. A mistake which just showed how incompetent he was in general, and so much so that he struck himself. This first blow wasn’t satisfying enough, so he hit himself a few more times. His face sang with a red hot pain and he knew this wasn’t good.

So he listened to his album. The lavender subsided, though it never went away. It was enough that he could sleep.

The next day he took his portable player and headphones with him to Rey’s practice space. Finn was there and it made Poe feel better.

“Hey buddy,” he said.

“Hey Poe.”

“I have that album if you want to listen to it. I have to take it back tomorrow.”

Nevermind that he was going to check it out again.

Finn squinted and looked uncomfortable.

“I really appreciate it. I just like the quiet.”

Rey swore, a stream of curse words which would daunt any fighter pilot’s vocabulary.

“Relative quiet,” Finn said. And then: “Sorry.”

“No problem, buddy.”

Poe’s eyes prickled and he rubbed his face angrily.

 

4\. _Praise_ _for the sweetness of the wet garden_

Rey kicked them out of her training space, wanting silence and solitude to meditate in. Finn looked lost but Poe was excited he could finally get Finn to listen to his album.

Instead they went for a walk in the nearby forest. Trunk and leaf and mushroom dripped from the latest rain, but the sky was a pale green through the uppermost branches of the trees. Everything smelled damp and fresh and it was quiet. Aside from some lirels nesting above, they were alone.

They tried talking about their childhoods. Poe jabbered on excitedly about learning how to fly with his mother, of playing pilot and soldier while his parents were away fighting for the galaxy, of that time he attacked a whole nest of Corsant fire wasps. Eventually he noticed how Finn hadn’t said a thing.

“So what about you?” he asked.

“I don’t remember anything before the First Order took me. My whole childhood was drills. Learning how to obey.”

“Oh.”

Poe mentally kicked himself for forgetting.

“I liked your story about the fire wasps. That was funny.”

“Oh, so it’s _funny_ when a six year old goes on a suicide mission and comes out swollen and purple as a ripe etabi fruit?”

“It is when it’s you.”

Poe laughed, and so did Finn. The sound settled around his heart, golden and warm. He realized how little he knew about this man, though he’d trust him with his life. He felt a flush of elation. He had so much to learn about Finn; so much to look forward to.

 

5 _. I’ve swam upon the devil’s lake_

The buzzing and the lavender subsided when he was with Finn. That he couldn’t explain, except that maybe companionship did that for a person. It made their burdens less. So he spent more and more time with Finn watching Rey. Even though he found it kind of boring -- there were only so many configurations Rey could stack a bunch of rocks using the Force -- Finn was there so it wasn’t so bad.

He also checked the tape out of the library again, and one day, during one of Rey’s training sessions. asked Finn about.

“I still have that album if you want to listen to it.”

There was a long moment during which Rey used the Force to stack one crate onto another while keeping both floating.

“Alright,” Finn said.

 _Alright. Alright. Alright._ Poe’s heart galloped like it did every time he roared down a runway.

They left that cavern and went back up to the ground level, to the barracks and then Poe’s bunk. Though he knew that Finn was sleeping in similar conditions -- a slender little room with a single bed and a small window facing out into the forest -- it still felt so intimate having Finn here, in a space that only he had occupied for the past few months.

They sat side by side on Poe’s bed, sharing the headphones as they listened to the album together. Finn smelled like the standard issue soap that the Resistance fighters had been given, and then something else. Something delicious and hot, like cyan. Poe could almost taste it on his lips and he struggled not to kiss the exposed back of Finn’s neck.

“So?” Poe asked when the tape finished. It had only been about forty-five minutes, but with Finn that had felt like forever.

“That’s brilliant,” Finn said. “Can we listen again?”

“Sure buddy, whatever you want.”

He was relieved that Finn liked the album and rewound the tape. They listened again, shoulders nearly touching.

Afterwards, they talked about the album, and then other things, mostly superficial. Poe felt disjointed, loose. Open, even. So he asked Finn the real question on his mind.

“You’ve seemed kinda down lately, Finn. You haven’t been yourself.”

“How would you know?” But he said it good naturedly.

“I guess I wouldn’t.”

Finn shrugged.

“I don’t know. It’s like when we talk about our childhoods. I’m a Storm Trooper --”

“ _Ex_ Storm Trooper --”

“But there’s still a lot of it up here,” he pointed to his head. “And it’s a lot to take in, all that’s happened to me. I’m still surprised to wake up and not be Storm Trooper barracks. It’s wild, how much my life has changed since rescuing you.”

Poe was quiet, listening. But the buzzing began to intensify, and the lavender wafted down from above, like smoke. He was alone in the cold of space with all his mistakes.

“I know,” Poe began. “I think I know what you mean.”

And it spilled from him then: his failure, being demoted, being grounded. But mostly the failure of his mission and the mutiny. The buzzing filled him from head to toe, and the lavender was drowning him again when Finn took his hand and squeezed. It felt like he was pulling Poe free of the quagmire.

“It’s okay,” he said. “We all make mistakes, Poe.”

“Not mistakes that cost people’s lives.”

Finn didn’t say anything, but he didn’t let go either.

 

6. _Something good has begun_

Poe changed.

It happened slowly as the summer months gave way to fall, to colder rain and the mushrooms blooming, filling the air with their soft-sweet scent.

As he sat with Finn while he watched Rey. As he took walks through the forest with Finn. As he ate lunch and dinner with Finn. As he listened to albums with Finn. Poe was changing. He didn’t rush through his morning routine now, but went about it with more patience, more thought. He wasn’t always racing to get places. He didn’t bolt down his food without tasting it. When General Organa talked, he didn’t sit and wait to speak. Instead he listened. And while being grounded was still utterly unbearable, he knew that would come to an end.

The buzzing and the lavender didn’t go away, but also changed. They folded into his interior landscape. They became like inner scars. He could touch them and remember what he had done. They were there. But they didn’t overwhelm him any more.

General Organa gave the order to move before winter settled in. So it was with the thrill of rebellion that he made a copy of the album, all the while thinking of Finn. He kept thinking of how Finn was a good man, perhaps the best man he had ever known, and he was filled with longing every time he was away from him. He daydreamed of what it would be like to go on one of their daily walks on a new planet.

All of this was lumped up inside him when he went to Finn.

Finn was rolling his bed up when Poe approached.

“Poe!”

“I have something for you.”

“Really?” Finn looked genuinely excited.

“Yeah. Here.”

He offered the tape to Finn.

Finn took it but he was wide eyed.

“You copied it?”

“Yeah, I did.”

“Don’t you want to keep it?”

“Nah, it’s yours buddy.”

Poe winked and then cursed himself. He couldn’t help it. Finn made him want to flirt.

Finn hesitated.

“Well okay. Thank you.”

He drew Poe into an embrace. It was warm and solid and Poe liked how their bodies fit together.

Finally they drew apart. They lingered, looking but not looking at one another. Poe could sense a bright hot line between them, drawing them together. He could take Finn’s head between his hands and kiss him.

But he had to go pack. General’s orders and all.

**Author's Note:**

> With many thanks to MemoryPalaceofWillGraham/JaxCat for also betaing.
> 
> This is my first foray into writing Star Wars universe. Please be gentle with me if I made any mistakes. :)
> 
> Though this is my first foray, it feels strangely like home. I grew up watching the original trilogy, and dipping my toes into this universe and adding my own little story feels right.
> 
> If you guessed that Poe was listening to Cat Stevens, you guessed correctly. I was given an album of his for Christmas and fell in love, and in my writerly vanity decided to inflict that on my readers. Whoops. Mostly I just like the idea of Poe and Finn sharing music.


End file.
